The laying of a board road has for at least the past 40 years been a manual task as has been the taking up thereof. The road is laid by placing a first layer of boards with their major axis along the line of travel of the road in adjacent staggered abutting longitudinal relationship. A second layer of boards are laid on the first layer with their major axes at right angles to the first layer. A third layer of boards are laid over the second layer with their axes at a right angle to the second layer and two spaced apart groups of 5 or 6 boards spaced about 30 inches apart define the wheel travel surface for vehicles using the board road. The boards of this third or top layer are staggered in abutting longitudinal relationship transversely and are nailed to the second layer about 5 nails per 16 ft. board to stabilize the travel surface. This board road may be 50 ft. to 5 miles in length.
The road described above is a 3 ply road; however, depending upon the compaction of the ground over which it is layed and the gross weight of the vehicles traveling thereover the road may be six or nine ply which only require adding additional layers as described above.
Preparatory to commencing construction bailed 50 board bundles are dropped at the construction site or spaced along the construction site where the workmen must walk back and forth between the bundles and the boards laid forming the road resulting in much lost time.
Other than the manual laying of a board road described above the only method and apparatus for laying board roads known to me are the following U.S. Pat. Nos.:
______________________________________ 70,514 Brown 1867 2,382,789 Guignon 1945 132,801 Chinnock 1872 2,639,650 Robishaw 1953 152,299 McCauley 1874 2,652,753 Smith 1953 174,659 Brisley 1876 2,912,909 Hart 1959 2,335,556 Wilson 1943 3,909,996 Ettlinger 1975 4,289,420 Davis et al 1981 ______________________________________